A few bungs down police trousers and an extraordinary two way relationship that made New Scotland Yard an annex of the Murdoch empire, have done for Sir Paul Stephenson. A moment’s reflection that the callous killing of an innocent Brazilian man was not considered worth the resignation of anybody. And on the phone hacking scandal, while Stephenson was as enthusiastic an establishment schmoozer as any, it was his predecessor Blair with whom most of the guilt lies. Like Brooks, at the most charitable possible interpretation Blair was a lousy manager who had no idea what was happening.

I am however rather suspicious that Brooks’ arrest comes just in time to avoid any questions about her relationship with Cameron and others at the select committee – or indeed why she was a facebook friend of the committee chairman.

I am still rather puzzled by why the police have not informed approximately 3,750 of the over 4,000 potential phone hacking victims that their names are on the list. By not informing the victims, of course, the police have so far limited the number of civil suits against News International.

It is hard to recall, (and nowadays I try not to recall it) but there was a period of a few weeks back in 2003 and 2004 when I was front page news, and there were a good few tabloid stories about Nadira’s belly dancing past. Now I wonder….

“I am however rather suspicious that Brooks’ arrest comes just in time to avoid any questions about her relationship with Cameron and others at the select committee – or indeed why she was a facebook friend of the committee chairman.”

why do you suppose she would answer any of the questions , would incriminate herself even before her arrest?

lets face it these committees are useless, and have been used in the past to defuse issues by being built up in the media and then the reulting Q & A an anticlimax ..after which the media in one chorus decide its no longer of any importance.

lets not forget it was those on the committee who realising that neither coulson or brooks knew that paying coppers was illegal made them aware of that fact before they could add further misdemeanours to their list of confessions.

trust no one least of all politicians in this matter since it is they who have abused their relationship with the media and continue to do so..

Wendy, she admitted that her news organisation paid the police at the same select committee before Kaufman in 2003. I know she’s older now. As somebody wisely put it on Craig’s blog a week or two back the Murdochs are using her as a firewall.

“He’ll then have the time, space & money to work on a plausible cover story to explain his (in)actions.” Old Mark

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Indeed. He’ll also have time to do some more deals and get a cushy, well-paying newspaper column for when he exist the Met. Nice work if you can get it, eh! Who says crime doesn’t pay?
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Bleedin’ heck, I could run those columns off ten-a-penny. 800 or 1600 words a week. That’s peanuts! It’s really easy, once you get into the swing of it. I used to write and record ‘Pauses for Thought’ for the Sarah Kennedy Show on Radio 2; I did around 15 of them. They’re a little like tabloid pieces, precisely 2 mins 45 seconds, less preachy than Radio 4’s ‘Thought for the Day’, accessible, not nasty, though, great fun actually, and relatively uncontentious – though I did manage to get some subtle references to Iraq, etc. into one or two! Without being in any way patronising, one’s aiming for a kind of lightly matey ‘Everyman/woman’ tone, an ambience of shared humanity which (since the only Lear jet I own is an Airfix model) is entirely genuine. Come to think of it, Estuary English might’ve come in handy (!)

“she admitted that her news organisation paid the police at the same select committee”
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She clarified that later by saying she was talking about the newspaper industry as a whole and not about her news organisation!. They couldn`t pin it on her after that!.

Mary, it is surreal here at present, something I have contributed to myself, but as above, so below, eh? For years we come here, knowing that what’s said by media and government bears little relationship to what is really happening. We contribute our little bits, try to fit it all together, get called insane, and make little progress. Then suddenly, it all unravels. No, we don’t suddenly discover the true state of the world, but a systematic lying and fabrication system is revealed, with just the links we always insisted must exist: politics, police, criminals, and the media. The dam breaks, chaos ensues, and as we’re all washed downstream together, we call out to each other the books we have read, songs we have enjoyed, or the sport on TV…
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I was going to say that the sport might be the only bit of TV that isn’t faked, but then I remembered… it is all my fault, I started it. Back in the ’80s a friend called Harriet got a job in TV. She told me of this amazing machine called “The Harry”. She claimed that with enough work, one could synthesize any moving image.
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A couple of months later, Harriet looked very tired. I asked her what was wrong. She was preparing the raw golf footage from the US for UK TV broadcast. “You can’t believe how frustrating it is. Each shot is covered by at least five cameras. On a drive, the player strikes the ball, and it just… disappears! A golf ball is tiny in a TV picture. I go through shot after shot, just looking for the one where the ball can actually be seen. I’m exhausted, and I’ve got square eyes”.
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“Oh”, says me, “can’t you just use the Harry? Putting a moving white dot onto the sky sounds like a doddle on that machine. Who would ever notice?”

Both John yates and Stephenson have left, resigned, they were not pushed by the Home secretary and she is left with the chaws of finding replacements, how do you find a good strong light in a box of 25 watt bulbs?

The news is being dragged out, still no assurances that rebekah brooks can answer question, all she has to do is take her lawyer and one of her matey police men, or that NI/yard twitter hayman, he can be asked whilst ‘looking after her’.

Thanks for the insight into the new recruiting tools of poor uneducated and willing canon fodder, even if its just 1% of them, what a waste of young lives, lets hope the fitness they receive will also open their minds to such indoctrination attempts via sport.